Dua

Unko khuda mile jinhe khuda ki hai talaash
Mujhe to bas ek jhalak mere yaar ki mile

Umra dedo unko jinhe jeena hai sau sau saal
Mujhko to bas mutthi bhar pal tere pyar ke mile

Rangeeniyan ye jahaan ki saari, jahaan ko hi mubarak ho
Jahaan muskura de ishq mera, gulshan mere wahin khile

Ek pal se doosre pal tak ji rahe hain hum isi dua mein
Ki kisi ko bhi jahaan mein yoon pal intezaar ke na mile

Aah nikal mere lab se, uske dil tak na pahunche kahin
Aankhein ab bhi hain nam, par hoth hain sile

Unko khuda mile jinhe khuda ki hai talaash
Mujhe to bas ek jhalak mere yaar ki mile...

Help!

Hey people...
I need your opinion.
Whether or not should I change this template?
So tell me tell me please. Some people like it some people hate it. And it's such a pain changing templates anyway.
So vote vote vote..by this weekend...will remove this post on sunday...

• Yes!
• No!
• Don't know/ Can't say/ Don't care.

Thanx!

Balancesheet

Brilliance is for free.

It's the limitations that cost.

The Bias

I've a few thousand questions for myself and no answers. Gosh I so hate myself...

Why does my 'happiness' depends so much on somebody else's happiness, and worse, somebody else's actions.......things that they do or don't? Why is my life a function of how somebody else chooses to live his/her life?

Why do I care? Why do I cry? Why do I do crazy things I don't really want to do just to beat the depression? Why does depression still manage to beat me?

Why don't I know what and who I really want for myself? Why am I afraid of wanting? Why do I teach myself to want only what's available and reasonably gettable? Why do I re-define contentment so that I could believe myself to be content?

Why do I forget the past when the present gives me things that are happier or worse than they have been? Why do I forget and forgive all harsh words the moment I hear one word of kindness or apology? Why do I overlook all the moments of care and affection the moment the pain in the present begins to mount?

Why does one moment of 'happiness' weigh more in comparison with hundred moments of pain? Why can't I receive all the things that life has to offer with equal gratitude?

Why the BIAS?

I really really hate myself.

Angel Garden

Angels look over me

each night when I sleep.

I'm quite sure they do,

but they disappear

if I wake up at midnight

hoping to find them.

It's a beautiful night

tonight; and so I wish

to steal for my aching arms

one big hug of love.

So tonight I'm gonna fool them;

I'll sleep with a sneaky eye open!

*************************************

I wonder why I'm so irregular in blogging these days. Maybe because nothing much comes to my lazy head to write about. Anyway, nobody cares...so why should I?

I'm pretty happy tonight, after a lot of time and despite the fact that I've had a rather long day, and it's not for any one single reason. Just like that you know...sometimes you wanna smile, and tonight the weather is so wonderful anybody muct smile. So I celebrate the completion of my first full month in Sweden with a smile to warm up the coolness of the air and to brighten the stars in tonight's awesome night sky. There's music in the air too you know, and I've just returned from this cute slightly arty Swedish movie (with english subtitles) called "ånglagärd" (Garden of Angels).

Life is a lot about the way we look at it, right. Can I look at it somehow that makes it appear as a beautiful garden, with some thorns but never mind them, where angels play and even devils protect? I wonder...I should try though.

But right now I'm thinking of another super line...line of the week actually...perhaps it is a German saying, but only swedes and no Germans believed that.

It goes...Happy people have no histories...

mmm...What do you think?

Spotted at a Stockholm Restaurant

The best brand of whisky for Indian guests:

BOFORS

It really fires them up!!

The journal of an abandoned girl

So, this is it.

He's decided to leave me. Or technically, he already has left me. Of course there are thousands of better women on earth, why should he have stuck to me anyway? But...but...err...but why? As in why did it not strike me to leave him before he left me??

Aaarrrggghhh I'm such a fool.

But...never mind. He's not the be all and end all. He isn't the last man on earth. He wasn't the greatest either. Sure he was cute and all, at least initially, but then, time withers it out right. Things never stay the same. If they did life would stagnate and rot. But, why do they always change for the worse? Usually, that is.

He left me. That bit is cool actually. It was natural. I mean, the last time I laughed with him was like, er, 5 months ago? And I hadn't even seen him for the last whole month. Sure something had to happen. This was never working out anyway. He doesn't fit in my scheme of things and life, and I didn't fit in his. We never had the real connect to last anyway. But what I absolutely HATE is the way it happened. Why didn't I kick him off before he coolly told me he was going to marry someone[???? :O :O]. As in..what the hell.. why didn't he ask ME to marry him? Of course I'd have refused him....he can be quite a pain at times and he has terrible mood swings. But, the catch is that I wasn't even asked...considered....OMG!

It isn't new of course. My ex-boyfriend also left me one day like that. And even the one I had in school years back. They never fight and curse or something. I have never fought with anyone. I always have peaceeful nice relationships that soon become loveless and then disappear. I never notice of course, which is why I'm not the one to find someone else and gently kick the guy. But they do, and they gently kick me with a bundle of polite chivalrous thank yous for all the nice time and the care. This one actually went on and on about the difference I had made to his life by teaching him to love and respect etc etc etc. Hello, those tuitions were so that you could love and respect me as long as i pleased?

Anyway, now it's over. I must go to his wedding three weeks before christmas now. But I need a few things before that. Like a nice sexy dress, and a couple of inches have to be lost at the right places so that the sexy tight revealing dress makes me look all the more desirable to him, and hopefully he'd curse himself for missing all that, and most importantly, a nice hunk whose arm I can take when I walk into the hall. I might have to rent some of those, mainly the latter one, but I don't care. I need to make him jealous, and once he's burnt, he can go to hell.

Meanwhile tonight I shall celebrate the demise of it all. But I need to figure out all this first. Why does everybody abandon me before I have the sense to abandon him? Why doesn't that cute foreigner who stays two floors down look at me with the same hopeful eyes I do eeach time I pass him? Something is terribly wrong...even worse than a bad haircut! Maybe I've grown too fat. Maybe I'm just the worst gal on earth.

Worst, and single. Actually, abandoned.

On a Saturday night!!!

Something aren't fair. What do you think?

For now it's on to Roxette, and tomorrow onwards I go on a diet!

It must have been love, but it's over now

It was all that I wanted, now I'm living without

It must have been love, but it's over now

It must have been good, but I lost it somehow

Aarghh..I hate it. I wanna die tonight.

P.S. Warning....mostly fictional it is...don't get misguided! :D

Needs

I first started thinking about the idea of "luxury problems" when I read this. So many of what a lot of us think and fret over are not issues of survival or bare necessity, but of comfort and luxury, of improvement and greed, because we are lucky enough not to have to worry about a lot of the former at all most of the time, unlike so many others.

A management lecture that talked about Maslow's theory reminded me of this yesterday. Abraham Maslow, a psycholigist, gave his pyramid defining the hierarchy of human needs in which he defined five (sometimes seven ) levels of human needs...beginning from basic physiological needs to "growth" needs and needs of self-actualisation which are "being" needs. Essentially to me, as u go upwards in the pyramid, the needs become more and more pertaining to "luxury". I guess it's rightly said that to everyone his/her own sorrow is the biggest and most painful, until he/she wakes up to the sorrow of the world outside.

Sometimes this makes me wonder, do we even have the right to feel upset and depressed and worried about little things and complicated intricacies when so many others have to worry about every single meal? But it's not a rhetorical question. We do have the right, and also the need, to feelthe sorrow, to experience the pain, to fight the worry and learn from it...but we don't have the right to stop living or being gratefulabout what we already have and take for granted because we have other issues.

Countless number of people have told me my lifeis so good and enviable because at a broader perspective, there's so much nice about it. So much love, so much opportunity and so much luck in my life. Some years back I couldnt even imagine I'd be sitting in Sweden viewing life at this level. But still, am I the happiest person? Am I content and in bliss?

Mostly, no.

I have my hordes of luxury problems, and also alot of Level 3: Love and Emotional security issues. Some kind of physiological issue worry me a lot, but they're too personal to talk to anyone, but at the same time I'm so upset and bugged each time I find a friend or a dear one worried, and I overlook everything in wanting to go back to them. I share a love-hate relationship with the peace and solitude here and have flooded the blog with that. Sometimes I think I'm so unfair to life by calling life unfair all the time and never valuing it and its kindness enough. Sometimes we all become so engrossed in little worries, some deficiencies, some failures and personal desires and disappointments that we forget everything else. Even ourselves of the past and the future. Even ourselves at the bigger holistic level. The local depression sucks our life, belief and esteem and we need our self-actualisation tutitions again. In a worse case, we even lose Love, security and social esteem, and we wither in the hostile turn of events.

But it still could be worse you know. We still have no right to give up hope because we still have lots that others don't. We just need to fight again and build again. Fulfil our needs, and get them fulfilled one by one, starting from the lower levels of the pyramid and then upward...because that is the way, that is the only way to get back what we lose.

Needs are fulfilled by deeds, and only step by step.

When one trip is cancelled, many happen...

Before I start, reigning thought of the day...kids all over the world speak the same language!

Kids are really the sweetest things on earth, almost the only good part about the human race. There's a world in a kid's smile -- a world of purity, innocence and love. Needless to say, I just absolutely adore children, and love playing with them a lot, be it India or Europe. Kids here are soo cute and lovable, one could just watch them all day. Yesterday I made friends with a couple of Swedish kids and although I didn't really understand much of the little they said, it wasn;t hard to understand what they meant. Kids all over the world really speak the same language. I didn't even want to leave, but it was time to get off, so I handed them a few chocolates and left. Their smiles were truly amazing...beyond my words.

Anyway, back to the topic of the post, a long, good-weather but yet mostly dark and depressed weekend just ended for me, and I have eight hours of backto back classes to attend in a couple of hours. Still the weekend was all about existant and non-existant trips though. I had planned an awesome cruise trip to Finland with some of my Indian friends here for the weekend, and the nine of us would have had a rocking time if we didn't have to cancel last minute. It turned out that I, and some of the others, were too young and too single to go on that cruise. Ah! I wish I had a boyfriend, or I was a few years older. Whatever...

So that cancelled, the mood slipped into a lot of inactivity and loneliness for two days. Too lazy to do any work, i just lay in my bed till the mood went from bad to worse to pathetic, and the very few who tried to IM me, just got yelled at for nothing. Sorry folks! A long chat with a dear friend and a mini-feast at the end of a dull sad saturday did it for me, and the mood slowly got better, esp as I had more things to worry about. So that trip cancelled, I thought we should do something on sunday for the weather has been no nice and warm touchwood that I spent the whole day in Sleeveless nothings yesterday[:P]. Got three of my friends willing, and after lots of planning and cancellation,just decided to explore the city randomly. So it was a random picnic at some place we don't know yet(we just climbed in and out of buses [:D]) but it was real fun with all the talking, teasing, games and all the kids and couples around!

Got back to a heavy dinner and a sound sleep, but this trip wasn't free of trips of another kind for me too! As in, there are somedays right when you just keep falling or tripping or hurting yourself. Something got to me yesterday then, though thankfully nothing serious or even worriable happened. It all started with me hurting a knee in the morning when I got out of bed. That was followed by a mini-accident, when I was getting into the Metro and my leg slipped and turned and got stuck in the space between the train and the platform. It hurt, and wouldn't pull back, but being a sunday afternoon, there was such a crowd immediately and thankfully someone pulled the emergency brakes too. And then, here comes one of my three friends who were slightly far absolutely worried that "Sandal to gayi ab!!" But, thankfully, two minutes later both my leg and the sandal were out unhurt, only the leg slightly twisted. And worry not, my friend got to taste the same sandal for himself! :D

Anyway, it barely even aches now, so it's fine. But the trips continued all through the day, none causing too much damage. I cut my hand with a knife and leg with broken glass too, and nearly slipped in water once. But it was a lucky, happy day. so i'm still in one piece. However, the moral of the story is...when one trip gets cancelled, many many trips happen!! :D

THE OBITUARY OF A SOUL

If I had a choice I wouldn’t have been her for sure. Not her. Anybody but her, if you ask me. But then, I never had a choice when I wanted (and too many where I didn’t want any), as usual.

She was attractive in a peculiar sort of a way. Most of the versions you heard of her made her seem alluring. And the some that were immediately repulsive also did not make you hate her in the way she out to be despised. Everything was inaccurate to some measure or another, but with her it was only to be expected. She was born with deception embedded in her system. Nevertheless, she had a powerful charm that was hard to miss or escape. If you too were taken in by her charisma at some point of time, I’d really not blame you. But I knew her better, or at least I got to know her better, and thus if I had a choice I wouldn’t have been her.

Among other things, her self-confidence was bewildering. It bordered on the edge of being remarkable once a while, but at other times it was uninspiring yet impermeable, something that always confuses me till now. Her cynicism was bewildering too, right from the instant when you begin to notice it. She had weird rules and weird ways to do things. Often her success was a fluke, but her failure was always much more conspicuous and disgusting. She lived with a self-created loneliness, sometimes only illusory. I liked the way she felt things though; she really felt them.

She spent a lot of time searching for me, because I always wished to escape from her once I was caught, but before today it was never a completely successful attempt. Still, I kept her busy often in her searches. She had lately begun to develop a liking for me though, and would talk at length. Mostly she would ask me questions, difficult ones. Sometimes she’d give me an answer and ask for the question too. We did become some sort of friends I must admit, and sometimes she would come to me when she was hurt and tired so that I could give her a warm hug and some comfort. But I could never be too attached to her. So I guess it’s ok now. I just knew her too well for her to be able to hide any weaknesses, and knowing all that it was perhaps impossible for anyone to like her any more than this. She wasn’t the best of companions anyhow; after a while she grew scared of intimacy with anyone and drove them away. And to top it, she was never too lucky with finding companions or people to be intimate with anyway.

Finally, today she drove me away too, and I‘m happy because as I said, if I had a choice I never would have been her. But then, look at the irony. Even today, people talk of me and not her, when they say ‘Ah…she was a good soul!”

Is this life?

Is this life? This surreal feeling...
I lay in comfort as the day climbs on
No worries for work, I let will rule
Soaking in every second as time moves on.
Not a sound except my keyboard taps
Not a word in my ears or my mind
Raindrops wet the window glass
And sunshine soaks my life
Not a soul who'd talk as I look outside
Greenery, but not even a perching bird
Not a soul who'd talk on my IM screen
Names, if any, carry the "Busy" word
Why am I not busy this morning?
Why will I be alone tonight?
Why do I live in this exclusive world?
This surreal feeling...is it life?

Nobody exists for me, I don't for anyone
Nobody to care for, and nurture or nurse
I'm free, liberated, closer to self
Nobody who wants my scolding or love
Raindrops keep falling on my head
Literally too, as I walk to class
Something gleams on the pavement
and my eyes, like a clear glass.
Peace envelops my heart and soul
In this country of the Nobel Prize
Yet this search tofind myself gets tougher
This surreal feeling...is it life?

W(h)e(a)ther or not!

Been quite some time since I posted anything...and come to think of it, quite some time since I wrote anything at all...no blogs no diary and the last time I wrote a poem/fiction was more than a month back! Perhaps I've forgot to pack my writing instincts in my luggage.

So I might just end up with a mediocre post here. But whether or not I do that, and whether or not I'm able to narrate all the happening things that keep happening in my life all the time, I shall post anyway!

When I started writing this post I was juggling between cooking lunch, eating breakfast and washing clothes. I left it in between to go to a class and then shopping and now I juggle a late lunch with room cleaning. Howzzat for multitasking!

But anyway, 'housewife-ish' harkate notwithstanding (and yeah, let me mention here that, just the way I've been boasting about it to everyone these days, I realise I can cook pretty decent food! Me and some others who I sometimes cook for actually eat it and like it. Wow!) life is pretty interesting. Classes have begun since a week, and I've already bunked more in five days than I did last semester at IIT!! Many of them have been because the timings clash and I can only be at one place at one time, and then most courses do not have attendance here, so if it is a really boring futile class like the one I should have been at the moment in, I just don't go! :D
Sweden is corrupting me, isn't it?

And a place where beer is cheaper and much more easily available than water is likely to corrupt anyone don't you think? Thank God it's not that cold yet, even though it'd getting cooler everyday (13 degrees already) so I can resist getting drunk at the moment...

As for studies, I really like classes here (yes I bunk but I still like them). They're so much cooler than back home, and I've made such an intelligent choice in courses that at the moment, none of them have an exam, only projects group work and assignments, which means I'm gonna keep really hectic till mid-October, and also that I'm gonna make some amazing friends by working in groups with them. There's a lot that IITs can learn from here, esp cooler profs. And by that I don't just mean cute profs who you won't mind just looking at even if you don't really listen to them, I mean profs who are obliged if you go to there class, who apologise if they forget to print the schedule which is on the web, and who would call the author of the book a bastard for using tough language in the text in class. This place can learn from IIT too. The students here are invariably smarter than the teachers, at least that's what I felt, and these people have succh weird class schedules! More on this later...

It's getting cooler, and it rains -- no, it pours -- almost everyday, but I still like roaming about in half sleeves and wearing jackets only when my 9pm class ends or if it's raining.Infact weather is the most dominant thing on everyone's mind here, but good weather or not,I make it a point to go out and explore the place when I have the time and mood. LikeI did last weekend when I had a rocking time with a friend, and luckily the weather often holds up till I decide toreturn home! :D

This place is good, beautiful and very comfortable, but India has it's own characteristic fervour that i miss some time. It wasone ofmy Indian freind's bday day before, and we celebrated it at night pure junglee Indian style, pouring cake and cream and what not on him and eventually us too. I miss being at college with all the noise and fun, but I wish to enjoy the peace and beauty of thisplace while it lasts. It's awesome, I have friends now from all over the world and the list is growing with every single day and esp every single class, and living independently has a charm that's almost addictive. You are free to be jealous if you wish, but I love this place anyway.:D

The only thing is, I love India too, and I love India more, so once this four-month period ends, whether or not India has this kind of silence and peace (and emptiness), whether or not it has all the facilities and infrastructure there exists here, whether or not I get to learn five international languages in one class, whether or not there are hunks and sexy babes wherever youlook, whether or not I get so much time to do things myself, I don't care, I shall still embrace MY home with more warmth than ever. I miss you people.